Rolls-Royce Wraith Eagle VIII Collection Has a lot to Admire

In June, 1919, Captain John Alcock and Lieutenant Arthur Brown made the first non-stop transatlantic flight in a modified WWI Vickers Vimy bomber aircraft. Of the event, Sir Winston Churchill commented, “I do not know what we should most admire—their audacity, determination, skill, science, their aeroplane, their Rolls-Royce engines—or their good fortune.”

Churchill called out the Rolls-Royce engines for a good reason. Just about everything that could go wrong on the flight did, with the exception of the Rolls-Royce engines. The Rolls-Royce Wraith Eagle VIII Collection pays homage to the duo—and the engines that carried them.

The Wraith is finished in a colour scheme reminiscent of the Vimy bomber—two-tone gunmetal and Selby grey paint that is dressed up with brass accents. Unlike the bomber, however, the cabin in an exercise in luxury.

The eucalyptus wood used in the dash went through a special “vacuum metalised” process to create gold, silver, and copper inlays that mimics a bird’s eye view of the moon-lit Earth. The custom clock has an “iced” background that references the instrument panel of the plane freezing up.

The headliner of the Wraith also received a special treatment to make it look like the exact nighttime sky of the flight at its halfway point thanks to 1,183 glowing fibres, with brass threads that outline the flight path Alcock and Brown took.